Living La Vida Loca
by Sera dy Relandrant
Summary: In which Suze De Silva, therapist, harassed junior league soccer mom, Vogue addict and mediator deals with a string of high profile nutcases. Multi Mag Cabot fandom crossover.
1. Decrepit Jurassic Relics

**A/N: For the purposes of this story, I've altered the characters' ages slightly, so Suze and co are in their forties, Mia's generation early twenties.**

When you're a kid you never appreciate the fact that the going-back-to-school season puts as much strain on your mom as it does on you. You're too busy whining about how the fiendish Miss Tate has it in for you this year and badgering mommy dearums to buy you a hot pink Barbie sweater set to match your branded Barbie backpack. Then when she doesn't, you consider yourself perfectly entitled to adopt an expression more suited for starving children in sub-Saharan Africa and skulk in the aisles.

This year I asked the kids to draw up a checklist of back-to-school supplies. Then I rounded them up in the garage before we went to the mall. After wrestling Ethan's Nintendo away from them, I addressed them, General-to-Insubordinate-troops style. All I needed was a whip - not that we didn't have one, but it was upstairs in the bedroom and I didn't want the kids asking what I did with it.

"There will be no prima donna airs in the aisles," I said, fixing Carla with my most kickass death-glare. "No smashing of crockery when I'm not looking." Dom had the grace to look guilty. "We will be there an hour, tops. No return trips. Do I make myself clear?"

I guess I made my point pretty well - we stayed only three hours, compared to Carla's minimum five. That certainly put me in a good enough mood to yield to their pleas that I drive them to school on the first day back. Of course I'd forgotten that Jesse had an all-night shift the day before. Consequently the first thing I woke up to this morning was Carla high-pitched squeal, "Mom we're going to be late!" and Ethan and Dom attacking me the way they do their dinners on Steak Night. At eight in the morning on a brisk September morning. Without coffee.

Those devil's spawn are _totally _Jesse's fault. I had nothing to do with them. Um, not much.

And so I drove into school, looking like a fossil without makeup, in Jesse's look-I'm-reaching-midlife-crisis SUV. You know, those sickeningly 'we-re-a-big-and-happy-family family' SUVs - shiny red and mutilated by Pro-Environment bumper stickers? That's the type of car we've been reduced to. The goodbyes were like the SUV too - exactly what you'd expect from a suburban mom in her forties:

"Carla, pull that skirt down. It's September."

"Whatever."

"Mom, don't forget to pick me up at three for soccer!"

"Yes Dom. Warm yourself some of that leftover stew when you get home Ethan."

"But it has _carrots _in it, Mom! Yuck!"

"Ethan De Silva, do we have to go over-"

"Oh my God, why do you have to stick in the parking lot like that, Mom? Seriously, it's humiliating being near a relic like you."

"Carla!"

"_Mom_!"

Ad nauseaum, till I drove out of the hellhole which had begun to brim over with miniskirted teenagers. Seriously, cup sizes have increased since I was in high school.

I grabbed a cream-slathered bagel and a coffee at a nearby Starbucks and browsed through the Horoscope and Finance sections of one of the newspapers, before work. All I needed was red matte lipstick and a Blackberry and I'd be a visual crash course in How-to-look-Forty. I texted Jesse to explain that I'd dropped off the kids and was going off to work - just in case he was worried. I'd also attached a Sticky Note to the fridge, but you never can be sure about men. Their nerves are delicate.

Now just in case you don't know, I'm a therapist. A pretty awesome one, even if my stalkerish secretary says so. Paul Slater got something right when he told me that that was the path cut out in stone for me, back in eleventh grade. I try to look the part too, though Vogue's not much of a help in that area - it's never drawn up a list Top 10 Ways to look Stylish for Therapists. Clearly it's biased against the overwhelming sexiness of our jobs. Which consists mostly in looking concerned when patients pour out their deplorable life stories (while you worry about the likelihood of your daughter flunking Spanish in seventh grade).

"Morning Mabel," I said politely to my secretary, when I reached the clinic where I sit three days a week. There are two other clinics I have to go to, and one of them being near Jesse's hospital we sometimes manage to make time for romantic lunches in overpriced Chinese restaurants where we squabble about who's going to fill the gas next week.

Mabel is ideally suited for representation to future posterity in a comic strip. As Calvin's intimidating teacher, perhaps, or someone in Dilbert. 'Stalkerish' doesn't quite cut it. Her eyes swivelled to me and took on an expression of devout yearning. Not that Mabel thinks I'm particularly hot. She does that to everyone and when reproached says she's just being friendly and wonders innocently why everyone is so cold and closed-up nowadays.

"Oh," she breathed and then her voice became a husky purr. Her eyelashes batted wildly _a la _Scarlett O'Hara and she began fiddling with the collar of her shirt. Not what you'd call aesthetic. "_Good _morning to _you, _my dear, _dear _Mrs De Silva."

"Um, yeah," I muttered uncomfortably, edging towards my door. I never ask Mabel who I have on any given day. Every extra minute spent with her is an ordeal in itself. Then I bolted into my office. It's a very pretty office done up in soothing pastels, linen upholstery, black-and-white photographs in gilt frames, carnations in crystal vases - all very classic, very designer. The cliched shrink's couch, beige-colored leather, was shoved under a window. The clear Carmel sunshine filtered in through the pseudo-Gothic windowframes. I slipped off my forest green sweater and took out a file, trying to look professional.

_Jennifer Greenley, case of..._

Sweet girl with a Midwestern accent. Played Muse to some famous moviestar - Luke Carla-would-know-his-last-name - who was researching a role in her highschool. Ostentatiously he pretended to have fallen in love with her crush's girlfriend, and then after aforementioned crush became her boyfriend, confessed his true love - for the boyfriend. They eloped to Jamaica, had a wedding reception at the North Pole causing untold emotional trauma to poor Jen.

_Elaine Harrison Wagner..._

This file was substantial. The wife of ex-Congressman Arthur William Wagner, on the Presendential campaign, who suddenly lost his mind and began to claim that he was the reincarnation of King Arthur. Seriously, _King Arthur. _I don't think it had anything to do with the fact that the movie, starring Zac Effron as King Arthur, was released soon before - but it might have. He was supported by some creepy Cult of the Bear and noted supermodel Jennifer Reynolds (who unsurprisingly, began to claim that _she _was Queen Guinevere. Or a reincarnation at least). Delusional Mrs Wagner was not one to skip the bandwagon - she was apparently the Lady of the Lake.

I always thought Arthur and Guinevere were Camelot's It Couple. I hear Mrs Wagner's being safely shut up in a 'boarding house' for those with mental disorders.

The door opened a crack and Mabel said in a stage whisper, "Lilly Moscovitz to see you."

I nodded. Lilly Moscovitz - twenty-three years old, working on her PhD in Harvard, Jewish, long-time friend and soon-to-be sister-in-law to Princess Mia of Genovia. Yes, I deal with very high-profile names. They pay for my pretty office, Carla's microscopic clothes, Dom's exorbitantly-priced soccer classes and Ethan's gizmos.

A pug-faced young woman waddled in. She had bottle-blond hair, oversized reading spectacles and the kind of Bow-to-Me expression you'd expect to see on a prom queen's face. Prom Queens were deadlocked in the security that rose from knowing yours was the hottest face around. In Miss Moscovitz's case, I had no doubt, her expression came from the security of knowing that she had the highest IQ in a five-mile radius. She dropped into the seat opposite to me and I knew there was no use telling her to take the couch.

"I've looked through your qualifications," she said in a businesslike voice before I could speak and promptly began to recite my resume. "They proved satisfactory. My parents are psychoanalysts but I felt I needed a second opinion on my er, mental state. My friend, Mia-" she fixed me with a beady stare to ascertain whether I knew who Mia was-"is vacationing here so I thought I'd look the local spots up, drop on you." In response to her death glare, I picked up my death glare and tried to look professional. I hate these kind of clients, these fruitfly-cloning pseudo-intellectuals who think the more Nietzsche you've read, the more you know about life. I was willing to bet she read an unhealthy amount of Freud in her spare time and imagined that that gave her the edge over me where psychoanalysis was concerned.

Yeah, like prospective patients wouldn't be _too _terrified of pouring out their souls to her.

"So Lilly," I said gently, "Tell me about yourself."

"I'd prefer, Mrs De Silva," she said stiffly, "If we could both keep this at the professional level. You can call me Miss Moscovitz - and you don't need to slop over the sugar with me." Slop over the sugar - like I was some kind of Southern belle! I'm from New Yorker, babe. "I consider myself a liberated individual, and I am quite aware of my own problems. I don't need to pay you to analyze them." _Then why the hell did you come to me? _"I need solutions."

I took up a notepad and looked at her. Out poured the tale. She was a bitchy little rich kid with an IQ of 210 (at last count), saddled at school by friends who couldn't have been stupider if they were morphine addicts. She liked men and she liked them hot and in large doses (though why they came to her remained a mystery). She had been, to put it mildly, promiscuous in high school - or at least more promiscuous than you'd expect the average geek to be. Her best friend (interchangeable with worst enemy, in Lilly's vocab) had the intellect of a two-year-old and the hair and body you'd expect on a Bond girl. Naturally her older brother had fallen for her. Add in proms, stalkers, heart-to-heart TV shows, bras that never fit, men who could not stimulate intellectually and you had Lilly Moscovitz's life in a nutshell.

Being a therapist is a lot like being a mediator - only you get paid, don't indulge in activities that mess your hair and your clients are alive. I took notes while Moscovitz ranted.

"Lil- Miss Moscovitz," I said when she paused for breath, "I understand your pain." I put my hand on my heart for emphasis.

She considered me doubtfully until I handed her my notes. I knew no analysis would satisfy her without supporting evidence. I'd counted the number of times each word had come up in her diatribe. 'Mia', 'retarded', 'snared' and 'Michael', 'genius' were frequent - and cropped up in distressingly close proximity to eachother. Her mouth opened and closed rapidly and she peered up at me through narrowed eyes. "You are a wom-" I changed the word, mid-syllable. She'd start on a rant on the anti-feminist, misogynistic connotations of the word 'woman', given half-a-chance. "A person of sense, Miss Moscovitz," I said, "and it is as clear to you as it is to me that you are in love with your brother."

She reached for the box of Kleenex on my desk, sensing melodrama. For good measure I handed her a candy from my candy jar. I elaborated on her incestuous crush, asking questions - to which she gave monosyllabic answers and nodded when I touched a particularly strong point. Her unwillingness to cooperate, her need to always have the upper hand, her unbelievable jealousy of her best friend, her promiscuity, her out-and-out obnoxiousness - they were all explained with a wave of my magic wand and a gallon of Freudian symbolism garnished with Jungian theories.

When I finished, she nodded.

"I expected as much," she said, wiping her nose with a tissue. Then as explanation she added, "I don't watch My Best Friend's Wedding seven times in a row, unless the situation is dire."

"For ideas?" I ventured timidly. Clearly the situation had turned dire when Millionaire Moscovitz finally proposed to the Princess from Manhattan.

She nodded. "I wanted a second opinion," she said.

"Miss Moscovitz," I said, "It is apparent to me that you are in need of more counselling. I can arrange-"

She looked at me in mild surprise. "God, no," she said. "Why do you think I'd need more counselling?" She tossed her hair. "I want to keep the feelings fresh, so I'll remember. They'll help immensely when I'm writing my book. Incest sells." Then spitefully, she added, "Her Royal Highness fancies herself an author. We'll see about that."

_Which is probably why you want to write a book. _She stood up. "I'm quite obliged to you, Mrs De Silva," she said matter-of-factly, putting out her hand. "Your communication skills, while shoddy, were tolerably satisfactory." She cast a disdainful look at my office. "I didn't expect much from you, of course. I was not disappointed." She nodded and left.

I pulled out my ultra-skinny laptop - the damn machine was sexier than I was - and checked my messages. I run a column for the mentally disturbed in a local magazine - 'Heart to Heart with Aunt Suze'. Yes, bleugh, I know. Believe it or not, it sucks worse than it's name.

_Dear Aunt Suze,_

_My parents are moving to a new state and enrolling me in a school for the ultra-geeky. I can't bear to leave my friends and I know I'll be ostracized at my new school where emphasis is more on the sciences, while I'm more interested in the arts. I was planning on running away but I can't because Dad'll probably put the Secret Service Agents on my trail. Please help._

_David_

Kids these days... and their parents. Sighing, I began to type an answer and lost track of the time. Typical do-gooder behavior, right?

A discreet tap on the door. It was Mabel again. "Paul Slater," she said briefly, before vanishing.

"What?" I squealed, lurching to the door. Cliched as it might sound, I could not believe my ears. This is what comes of having such a hostile relationship with your secretary - you never know who'll be sprawled out on your fainting couch, confessing his inner pain, next. "Mabel-" I yelped, wrenching open the door-

Only to stumble into the arms of someone I knew too well. "Crap," I muttered, relaxing for just a second in those arms. He smelled very corporate macho - scented teak, crisp linen shirts and new leather. I hadn't seen since him since I was pregnant with Dom, a good twelve years ago, though I'd heard a lot from Father D who'd kept in contact. Yeah, he oozed the toothpaste-model, summerhouse-in-Italy, Lamborghini-driving charm she'd expected of him. With a slight paunch that his shirt and belted jeans could not quite hide. His tennis tan had not weathered the years unscathed either.

He sounded amused as he said, "And here I thought I'd be the one taking the couch."

"Hello, Paul," I muttered, steadying myself. He shut the door, from Mabel's prying eyes, and leaned against the doorframe. "My secretary and I, don't uh, have a good working relationship," I said nervously, looking down at my shimmeringly colorless manicured fingernails. "I wasn't expecting you."

"Clear," he said, frowning, looking down at my nails. "I remember you used to paint them green."

_Like green nailpolish wouldn't look too tarty in a woman my age. _"I grew up," I said. "I hope the same can be said of you." I turned my back on him and strode to the desk, wondering whether he was checking out my ass. "Take a seat."

He lounged on the couch. "That wasn't too friendly," he said dryly. "A really involved therapist would have said, 'Please have a seat, Mr Slater while I look stunning and sympathizing as you moan and milk you of $100 an hour.' You look beautiful, Suze."

"And you look like a Lolita-killer, leering at me like that," I returned. I waved my ring finger at him. "So what's up, Paul Slater, hotshot lawyer? What brings you to this neck of the woods?"

"Well, my firm was holding a meeting in Carmel, and I decided to look old friends up-"

"At a therapist's office?" I said, eyebrows raised.

He shrugged impatiently. "De Silva would probably freak if I turned up for Sunday brunch. And I doubt the little ones would be too thrilled to see their dad bashing up an old family friend."

"Carla'd probably think you were ex-claimants for my hand in marriage," I said, and instantly wished I'd bit my tongue. He was grinning. "She's still at the Mills and Boon stage," I said apologetically.

He looked intrigued. "You have three right? How old are they? Do they look like you?" His baby blues pierced into my algae-green eyes.

"Yes," I said and I started to brag like any mom would. Moms never realize that their kids are not as fascinating to other people as they are to them. And I, deplorably enough, am a mom. "School reopened today. They're at the Mission and without Sister Ernestine, the school dresscode has been relaxed - marginally. Carla's in eighth grade and she's the spitting image of Maria De Silva," I said, making a face. "Dom's in sixth - chip off the old Sleepy-and-Dopey block. Ethan's in third. My babies," I said, pointing to a photo of the three grinning toothily, red-lipped like blood-drinking cannibals from eating too many watermelon slices at a BBQ party.

He was smiling. "Cute," he said, "I never pictured the great Suze Simon as a soccer mom. Miracles do happen." He shook his head at my unanswered question. "Three wives, baby, and their pre-nups and alimonies are killer enough without kids." He flashed me a grin. "I prefer the single life." The first thing I thought after he said that was, how sad, you don't know what you're missing, Slater. Which just goes to show how much I've changed. In a good way, I hope.

"You know," I said, after an awkward pause in which he tried to stare me down and I began fidgeting, "You don't have to pay me for talking to you, have lunch with me and-"

He whistled. "I'd like that, Suze," he purred, fluttering his eyelashes _a la _Mabel (who'd probably been ogling him blatantly while he waited). "I really would." I immediately regretted my offer. "But I do have a business reason for calling on you. Pleasure can wait - for lunch."

"Beam me up, Scotty," I said.

He steepled his fingers - a Power Posture that corporate types love to use. "Jake's moved to Chevy Chase. He's a vet." I nodded. "Well, he and Bertha have had the misfortune to give birth to the most-"

"The kid's a mediator?" I demanded, cutting him short. It was plain that Paul was as fond of his nephew as he had been of his little brother.

He shook his head. "Worse, Jack's a-" he made quote marks in the air-"an artist. Imbued with the passionate flames of rebellion. The burning of his loins compels him to shoot the windows of his father's veterinary practice, swim in the nude at the county pool, date cheerleaders whose irate parents have threatened to sic the proper authorities on him on charges of trespassing-"

I chortled.

"A mediator would be simple," Paul said blearily. "No wonder I don't have any kids. I thought you'd be able to help - you must see this daily in your line of work."

I did. "Well," I hedged, "I can see where he's coming from - he's _your _nephew, after all."

Sighing I leaned back in my chair and began my usual lecture - sit down and talk with him, make him feel loved ("He's unloveable, that little monster"), beat him into the straight and narrow if necessary, enforce rules, tie him to a chair and read him the Riot Act but be very respectful... He listened attentively. "It's not gonna work," he said in the end. "One word - genes."

**A/N: According to urbandictionary, a soccer mom is:**

**Suburban mother with 2.3 kids with hollow disciplines and automaton husbands with slowly diminishing spirits. Typically Caucasian. Their cabals are usually averted to music unfamiliar to that of their youth. **  
**Soccer moms are mostly responsible for the gaggle of kid safe laws ranging from stop signs every two feet to inundating TV and video game ratings to the manufacture of the "V chip". They aspire to the halls of Congress and the floor of the Senate to champion causes in the name of their families at the cost of casual freedoms. **  
**They are reclusive, passive agressive, morally ambiguous and secretive. One should be wary of traveling through a soccer mom's natural habitat as your presence will be secretly alerted to by the authorities under vague and even false suspicions. **  
**They also reside in urban and metropolitan areas.**


	2. The Origami

After Paul dismissed myself from my office, I had two other clients to attend to. Luke Castellan - a hyperactive, dyslexic college heartthrob whose overt preppiness and hey-I'm-just-a-nice-guy-no-really-I-am smirk reminded me almost uncannily of Paul at his youthful, frolicsome best. Luke's family aimed to redefine 'dysfunctional' - a schizophrenic banshee of a mother and a commitmentphobic, always-on-the-run, kleptomaniac dad who paid neither visits nor child support and a brood of unruly, fiercely competitive half-siblings did not make for one, big, happy family. Plus, he had hinted darkly about his 'cousins' - a trigger-happy gaggle comprising succubi, axe murderors and obsfucatingly stupid geniuses. His best friend, some Thalia I gathered he still harbored a kindergarten crush on, was apparently 'in a vegetative state', as he delicately expressed it.

Actually, he called her 'an olive tree'. Maybe that's the tasteful way of saying someone's in a coma, these days? Maybe I should ask Carla.

After him, I entertained the complaints of a Miss Haruhi Fujioka, a pretty, five-foot-nothing Japanese lawyer with a gunmetal-hard brain and absolutely no sense of humor. Since the age of fifteen she had been harassed by the predatorial sexual advances of six dashing young men of considerable financial means (I remembered eleventh grade with Paul in tow, multiplied that by six and moaned in sympathy for her). One had the emotional intelligence of a particularly retarded six-year-old, one had a heart forged of solid titanium, two were into threesomes and twincest, one looked like an eight-year-old and subsisted on a diet of sweetmeats and the last was _his _cousin and madly, deeply and hopelessly (but stoically) in love with him. Oh, did I mention she happened to be a crossdresser? I suggested a sex change and her face brightened up immediately. She was charmed by my ingenuity. So was I. My own brilliance dazzles me at times.

Paul waltzed in just while I was packing up, with a Hermes scarf of appeasement. "Lunch?" he reminded me.

I rolled my eyes. "You don't have to bribe me, you know. But thanks anyway."

Paul bounced in the background while I speed-dialed 'J'. What can I say? I'm still a lovesick teenager at heart. You would be too if your man was as hot as my man.

Oh my God. Did I just refer to Jesse as 'my man'?

I'm turning into Kelly Prescott in my dotage.

He picked up on the second ring. "Susannah?"

"Hey," I said, a trifle breathily, because Paul had chosen just that moment to gallantly drape my newly-acquired scarf over my shoulders. Gallant? Paul? Hah, not in a million years. He probably just wanted to sniff my neck or something in his freaky stalkerish way. "Um, are you busy? See, an old friend-"

He snorted eloquently in the background and I glowered at him, making shushing motions with my fingers.

"-Dropped in and he's uh, taking me for lunch at-"

"The Origami," Paul said coolly, naming the most expensive and select restaurant in the vicinity. Times change, people don't.

"-The Origami and I was wondering if you could join us?"

Paul sounded a trifle put out as he said, "Suze, seriously, you're forty. It's a public spot. You don't need a chaperone. And you're not exactly in any danger of losing your virginity."

I put my hand on my hip and glared at him, temporarily forgetting Jesse was on the line. "Who's to say I haven't had hymen reconstructive surgery done?"

"Is it Paul?" Jesse sounded amused. Frankly, that was insulting. I'd expected - well, hoped - he'd sound more... possessive. Ah those were the good old days, when two hot young men used to fight, shirtless and sopping wet, for little old, twenty-five-inch-waisted me.

"How'd you guess?" I demanded.

"Prescience?" he suggested, chuckling throatily. "Yes, I think I can make it, _querida. _It's always pleasant to meet old friends. Goodbye."

"Bye," I said and for good measure I added, "Love you, Jesse."

He chuckled and with a last click, the line died. Paul meowed. "Catty, aren't we? Honestly, it's not like you're a great catch anymore, Simon."

I let my glance linger a moment too long on his teensy-weensy hint of a paunch. It was sure to blossom into a beergut, give it a decade or two. His smile quickly faded and he muttered, "Bitch," before wheeling out. Don't let constructive criticsm get to ya, kid.

I took a last look at myself. For a forty-something, I'm in pretty good shape, even if I do say so myself. Straight, silky, shoulder-length copper-brown hair that I shampooed everyday with guava-scented shampoo to get that special texture and luscious smell ('You might not be pretty, but your hair sure smells good,' Ethan assures me). Green eyes tastefully ringed with eyeliner, eyeshadow, mascara and any other eye-products you might care to name, all pilfered from Carla's dressing table. Curvy hot-mamma curves stretching luxuriantly under my pristine white linen shirt and knee-length skirts to hide the cellulite. Mineral-based MAC dust-on powder and bronzer that hid nearly all the wrinkles and spots. The ones that weren't quite hidden just gave character to my face. I was pitchfork red, I'd been around the block, I was the older woman all the young men wanted a piece of...

Yep, I wouldn't need to resort to Botox for at six years.

Paul honked. Grabbing my Louis Vuitton tote I stumbled out of my office, my stilettos clickety-clacketying all the way until I hopped into his black Porsche. "Smooth," he said dryly.

I stuck out my tongue at him and slipped on my Ray Bans. "Just drive." The wind in my hair, a Porsche to bring out the sheen of my swanky-new silk scarf and a hottie at the wheel... I was so deliciously happy that I had to remind myself to cross my fingers for luck. God resents happiness, you see. For all I knew, if I hadn't taken the precaution of crossing my fingers against Fate, I'd have probably gotten a phonecall just then, from Ethan's school telling me that he'd vomitted Frooti Loops and milk all over the classroom and that I needed to pick him up.

Yes, it's happened before. Jesse assures me that it runs in the family - he was into serial vomitage back in Ye Olde Schoolhouse.

We drew up before The Origami and I sailed in, on Paul's arm. It's a beautiful place, The Origami, the ambience almost being worth the cost. Think floor-to-ceiling glass walls and sun-splashed black marble, flame-bright marigolds swimming in bowls of cool jade bowls, rice-paper walls with tastefully erotic silk wall-hangings of languorous geisha in bird-of-paradish kimonos and amorous samurai, haiku carved into the lacy woodwork.

Paul was smiling down at me. "Like it?" he asked in a stage whisper. But then, being Paul, he had to ruin it by adding, "I bet Rico Suave doesn't take you here that often."

_Because we have three growing kids, maybe? Do you remember anything about college tuition, Slater? _"So it's still a sore spot?" I asked sweetly. "Seems like some people just can't grow up."

The maitre directed us to a little table set for three. Since Jesse hadn't arrived yet, I looked around a bit. There was a table set for a large group of twenty-somethings. A large group of very photogenic, very professionally touched-up, very familiar-looking twenty-somethings.

Yep, The Origami attracts a large celebrity clientele.

I let my eyes feast on them for a couple of seconds, just like Dom and Ethan did at animals at the zoo. There was Princess Mia, every PR agency's wet dream, every monarchy's jackpot. She was a Disneyesque, blond, pro-Greenpeace vegan with the 5'11-110 pounds frame of a supermodel. She wasn't into drugs, drunk-driving or crotch-flashing at nightclubs and she was going to be married in a fairytale ceremony soon. What was not to love?

A good-looking, dark-haired boy with a prominently Jewish nose and gorgeous shoulders hovered around her. Ah yes, Michael Moscovitz - the young genius who'd built a robotics empire and with the help of a few millions successfully wooed the imperious Dowager Princess's consent. Michael Moscovitz was all kinds of wonderful, I was sure, but looking at him depressed me. He reminded me too much of Michael Meducci. Christ they had the same first names, the same initials, they'd both been genius hotbods (though Meducci's face didn't hold a candle to Moscovitz's)... and there was where the resemblance ended. Meducci was serving a lifetime sentence for a quadruple homicide (and attempted murder of five). And Moscovitz kind-of wasn't.

I wondered what would have happened if Lila Meducci hadn't gone to that poolside party... would things have spiralled out of control the way they had? Christ, Michael was a kid. Sixteen is too young to be held responsible, you start to realize that when you're forty. Would _that _Michael have been the same as _this _Michael, given the same opportunities? Come to think of it, what would Moscovitz do if his little sister, Lilly (the coincidences were freakish), ended up in a coma? Would he have wanted revenge? Well, hell yeah, he would have but... but would he have gone the whole way?

I read in a book once: _You can never tell what a person has in him until you start taking things away, one by one. _

It's true. You never can tell.

A girl who was almost obscenely like a caricature of Kelly Prescott at sixteen stepped out from the Princess's table and marched over to us. She had the cheerleader walk - perky, bouncing boobs, sculpted, bouncing ass, rolling hips, head held high, chiselled chin outthrust, long, blonde hair splashing all over the place. She even _talked _freakishly like Kelly. "_Paw-wol_," she sang, managing to imbue that word with two syllables.

She bent low, so we both got a good look at her tanned cleavage, pushed sky-high by her Wonderbra and adventurously, intimidatingly skimpy Betsey Johnson minidress. This was more than explicit. I wanted a handkerchief.

"Lana, babe," he greeted her. "This is Susannah De Silva, an old friend of mine."

Miss Look-My-Boobs-Don't-Sag-Yours-Do spared me the barest glance. "Hello, I'm Lana Weinberger," she said coldly, thrusting one manicured, scarlet-taloned hand at me.

"What are you doing here?" Paul asked her.

She rolled her big blue eyes at him, thickly-mascared eyelashes fluttering exaggeratedly. "You're such a dork - I'm here for Mia's wedding of course! And you are..." Her glance trailed suspiciously over me. So I'm still vampish even for the Prom Queen to glower at me and sink her predatorial talons into her man? Sweet.

"Business." He didn't elaborate, but a trace of mocking smile lingered on his face. Paul's good at juggling women. Midlife crisis comes to men in many ways, see? Beerguts, football, cybersex, SUVs, nubile arm-candy... I've heard of them all. Shuddered too.

"Oh," she said, sulkily. Then, remembering her manners, she said brightly, "Have fun. I'm staying at the Pebble Beach Resort. I'll be expecting you tonight." _Touche. _She blew him an air kiss and sauntered off, clearly elated with herself.

"Girlfriend?" I asked dryly, after she'd returned to her rightful table.

He waggled his eyebrows. "She wishes. Nah, she's a little too... virginal for my taste. Too fresh, too perky, too... well, you get it. She's my plastic surgeon's daughter."

"_What_?" I gaped at him, scrutinizing his face. Paul didn't plastic surgeory! If Paul needed plastic surgeory, then I needed a complete makeover.

The faintest blush crept over his cheeks. "Botox," he said quietly. "Don't look at me like that, Suze. You're going to need it in a couple of years."

"You should have invested in some abdominoplasty as well," I retorted crisply. "And a tanning bed as well."

"Excuse _me_, Mrs De Silva, but you're not in great shape either."

"But atleast it's all _au naturel. _Don't you wish you could say the same for yourself?"

"Well excuse _me_-"

"_Querida_." He swept down upon me with a kiss.

Paul rolled his eyes expressively. I winked at him. "Get a room," he gritted out, looking mildly insulted that we were going at it with such gusto. I didn't think he was jealous, just resentful that there was a better kisser than him around, someone who _really _knew how to give a girl her money's worth.

Did I just make Jesse sound like a gigolo?

The plates were black and - oh all shapes - s_quare. _Very classy too, with a delicate pattern of bamboo leaves painted in stark white on the side and a different haiku, in spidery Japanese characters (the translation in English beneath them) for every plate. Mine read,

_Summer grass_

_All that remains_

_Of soldier's dreams._

Talking about cheery. I browsed through the hand-stitched silk pamphlets - with the universal motif of geisha and samurai locked in compromising positions running through it - that served as menus.

"So, Jesse, what have you been doing with yourself?" Paul said, his voice as bright and false as Lana's had been. "A doctor? How nice and socially appropriate of you, helping those in need, but does it pay?"

"Oh please," I snapped. "I don't care if you're paying for this lunch, just drop it, OK? We're not particularly interested in the details of your salary and how many thousand dollars you rake in every minute just by lying your ass off and looking pretty."

"I'm pretty?" he said gleefully.

"You're plastic. Barbie's plastic," I told him. "So, yeah, I guess you're pretty. Until the Botox starts melting."

Jesse shuddered for effect. Yep, we have this awesomely awesome telepathic connection of awesomeness.

Paul chose a different tack. "How're your stepbrothers?" he asked. "Jake, Brad? I know about Dave, of course."

I grinned. _Everyone _knew of Dave (he'd hit the hotness jackpot during puberty and after ninth grade, he was strictly a Dave, not a David, to the rest of the world) Ackerman. Chairman of his own Forbes 500 Company, gazillionaire, philanthropist. He'd had the cutest marriage ever, with his middle-school sweetheart, Shannon. The press milked _that _human interest piece for weeks, the Awwwww factor being just about irresistable. They're going to have their first baby in three months.

Jake, after months of denial and a week of dating our vapid, vampish twelfth-grade Homecoming Queen finally came to terms with the true nature of his sexual orientation. Amidst rain, lightning and the sound of a thousand fangirls' hearts breaking, he'd confessed his undying love to his best friend - Neil Jankow. Yeah, Craig's brother. Now, Jake did something with cars, Neil did something with his family bars and they were as happy as a pair of partridges in a pear tree.

Dopey, being too dumb and too hot (gag) to be anything else, was a gym trainer. He was actually fairly good at it - he'd managed to reduce Miss Mancuso of the Montana-sized butt to a size four from a size... oh I don't know. Size fifty?

The food arrived, slivers of color and wafting fragrance photogenically arranged, immaculate in their miniscularity. The Origami must have the highest price-per-ingredient rating on the West Coast. While I concentrated on elegantly toying with my food - trade me a cheeseburger over sushi any day - the conversation went something like this:

Paul: "So, Jesse, I know you're a busy man, don't get much quality time for the kids-"

Me: "We manage perfectly fine, Paul. Eat your vegetables."

Paul: "-I wasn't talking to you, Suze. Playing doctor-"

Jesse: "I prefer to think of it as more in the line of 'saving lives', Paul. I am a neurosurgeon."

Paul: "I suppose you are, but does it _pay_? Tell me, Jesse, where was the last place you vacationed in? Not the Swiss Alps, I'll bet. Understandable, considering your meagre-"

Me: "For your information, it was in Barbados, and at least we don't have to siphon millions paying alimony."

Ad nauseum. That man could do with a few kids - he needs some major growing up to do. Maybe I could sic Carla and Dom on him for the weekend?

Snatches of conversation floated by as Ferragamo-heeled, Dior-draped patrons, Ricci-scented patrons glided in. A tall, pale, aristocratically ferret-faced young man and his pretty, blue-eyed girlfriend with wavy reddish-brown hair settled down next to us. She had a British accent and the pedantic, eager-to-dispense-information tone of voice I'd always associated with editors of school newspapers, "-Japanese cuisine, an exquisite testimony to the-"

The boy drawled out languidly, "A Malfoy bride's purpose is not to enlighten or educate, but to entertain. I thought we'd already gone over that, Rose?"

She laughed. "Mum would just freak if she heard you saying something that chauvinistic, Scorpius."

"I think your Dad's doing enough freaking out for both of them." Abruptly, his voice switched - he was clearly mimicking Rose's dad, and judging from her giggles it was a dead-on imitation. "_Rosie! How could you! A Malfoy, a Slytherin! Where did we go wrong with you_?"

My cellphone bleeped and rummaging through tissues, sunglasses, paperback porn, lipsticks, spare change and car keys I wrestled it out of my Vuitton handbag. A message from Carla.

Major WTF moment. What was she doing messaging her Mom in the middle of school? Something, she'd once assured me, she'd never be caught dead doing? Was she in trouble? Was it a hostage situation? An earthquake?

Jesse had read the sender's ID and, exploiting his semi-telepathic connection to me, had read my mind. "Querida," he said gently, reaching out and patting my hand. "It'll be fine. Just read it. I'm sure she's not in any-"

"You don't know," I assured him darkly while Paul occupied himself looking clueless.

_There's this ghost-dude at school who says he knows you, Mom. I think you'd better come over and talk to him when you're picking up Dom? I told him to wait for you at the school gates, cause I'm not dealing with him. Toodles._

Yes, Carla's a mediator. What'd you expect?

"A ghost-dude who knows you?" Jesse repeated suspiciously. "Perhaps I had better join you and check-"

I rolled my eyes. "_Jesse_. I'm capable of looking after some things myself, you know. Give me some credit."

He didn't look entirely convinced. That is so not my fault. "I think-"

I looked at him until he fidgeted a trifle guiltily. "Stop playing the responsible-and-mature card on me. That grew old a look time ago. Besides, overprotective doesn't look so good on you." I touched his hand gently. "I'll be fine."

He smiled uneasily. "If you're sure-"

"I am," I assured him, leaning over to kiss his cheek and getting a refreshing whiff of that familiar soapy smell he exudes. You wouldn't believe how comforting soap can smell. "Besides, I have you for backup, just in case things get rough don't I?"

"Of course."

Paul chose that moment to display his innate lack of maturity by gagging and muttering, "Get a room, you two."

"Jealous, much?"

"You wish."

**A/N: Luke Castellan is kind of the Paul Slater of the Percy Jackson series. Haruhi Fujioka is the awesomely unass-kicking (but still badass) heroine of the manga 'Ouran High School Host Club'. Both of them are to be loved to pieces. **


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